A Study Of Jesus Christ Superstar

Jesus Christ Superstar, is a rock musical with music by Andrew Lloyd Webber and lyrics by Tim Rice.The musical is written between1969-70, started as a rock opera concept recording before its first staging on Broadway in1971. The musical uses a combination of rock band and orchestra, tells a story of the Passion of the Christ from The Bible.In the musical, Webber focused on the use of musical theme, using musical theme and its development process to portray roles,depict dramatic action, and to build musical theater structure. By all these means, Webber converted the narrative perspective of Passion of the Christ,which is always been viewed under the religious angle in western culture. By setting the story in the context of the1960s, the musical take the Passion on a new significance. Through the analysis of the work’s musical theater techniques, this thesis aims to investigate the relationship between the musical’s form and content, explore the formation of the musical’s dramatic theme and the auther’s purpose.The dissertation will be divided into three parts eight chapters to expound.The first part discusses the musical’s subversive interpretation on the biblical story and characters, divided into two chapters:Chapter Ⅰ analyzes the possibility of carrying out a subversive interpretation on the Passion; Chapter Ⅱ compares the traditional Passion works’story with Jesus Christ Superstar’s, to show where the subversion is.The second part discusses that what narrative perspective the musicl has taken, divided into two chapters:Chapter Ⅲ analyzes the theatrical logic of the musical,and compares it with the traditional Passion works’; Chapter IV analyzes the dramatic structure of the musical, and explore how it matches the musical’s theatrical logic and the narrative perspective.The third part is the understanding of the musical’s dramatic theme and the auther’s purpose, divided into four chapters:Chapter V analyzes the dramatic theme of the musical; Chapter VI and VII place this theme under the context of the1960s, to explore its implication on society and culture; Chapter Ⅷ tries to find out Webber’s purpose on expressing this dramatic theme.